


like the sound of your heart in your head

by nosecoffee



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, Companion piece to chapter two of Exit Music for a Film, Drowning Metaphors, Extended Metaphors, He could murder me and I'd say thanks, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, i love Jughead so much, roadtrip au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 14:39:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10573344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nosecoffee/pseuds/nosecoffee
Summary: It begins like this:'This is the way the world ends.'It continues like this:'Even you knew I wasn't worth it.'It ends like this:"Fine."





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [angeburger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/angeburger/gifts), [Lyxxie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyxxie/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Exit Music for a Film](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10552292) by [angeburger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/angeburger/pseuds/angeburger), [Lyxxie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyxxie/pseuds/Lyxxie). 



> If you haven't read Exit Music for a Film by angeburger and Lyxxie yet, I highly recommend it.  
> Like, seriously, if you'd like to read this, read Exit Music for a Film, specifically Chapter Two, or this won't make much sense.
> 
> Title from 'Quiet' from Matilda the Musical

It begins like this:

_How do we start again?_

It begins like this:

_Just let me._

It begins like this:

_This is the way the world ends._

Archie feels a sickness sitting somewhere between his lungs and his gut and it makes his soul writhe.

It's not quite nausea, but it's not quite nothing, either.

Never mind the sun kissing his neck and shoulders and arms, and biting and clawing; never mind the wild way that Jughead's looking at him.

_This is it._

It's more than he's ready to bare.

Wasn't the road trip a way for them to escape the tears, the hate, the screams?

It's seems as though they've failed.

He wishes they hadn't stopped so long that the things they'd tried to leave behind, in Riverdale, had caught up.

Now, he knows, it's much too late and he's standing with his toes buried in sand that burns his skin, eyes fixed on a face that never should have a right to look like that - like broken, never broken - his mouth tingling with a memory of a kiss that he both craves and recoils from.

It hits him then.

Hits him that there is nothing that he can say or do to change Jughead's mind.

It continues like this:

_You saw, and you ran away._

It continues like this:

_You saw all the signs._

It continues like this:

_Even you knew I wasn't worth it._

Every syllable is a punch to the most vulnerable places in his mind. It makes him sick to the stomach as he registers how right Jughead is, and bile rises in his throat.

Jughead's defeated, but he's still fighting.

His mind may have surrendered but his heart is still thrumming, beating wildly with life, with fight, with determination to live.

If it wasn't, Jughead would be dead by his own hand by now.

For some reason, Archie's thankful that they got out of the car, that Jughead's fight-or-flight instincts kicked in and he sprinted into the desert.

Archie would've hated having this fight in the car, can imagine how much harder it would be to punish himself for not having been able to help, for being too caught up in his own problems that he was too blind to see Jughead floundering, reaching for him.

Jughead was drowning, and Archie hadn't even known until he pulled him out of the lake himself.

Jughead's laughing and it should be good, but it's not. No, it's so wrong, so wrong that it's practically grabbed Archie by the shoulders and is shaking him.

He's pulled the wrong boy out of the water - he's entered an entire other dimension in which Jughead isn't afraid to spit lies and truths twisted together like ivy beneath a beating sun, so cold that it doesn't make sense how he still stands there in the heat, so like ice that it's a wonder he hasn't melted from this world.

It ends like this:

_Not in fire, but in ice._

It ends like this:

_Complete and utter despair._

It ends like this:

_"Fine."_

An insincere word spoken by an insincere tongue.

It's not fine. It's as far from fine as they could possibly be.

And then-

_Don't open. Drop dead._

He's spilling everything out onto the sand - blood, skin, memories, the vile taste in his mouth that stuck and didn't go away no matter how hard he wished it would.

And it's like they've switched places, like its his turn now.

Archie begs himself not to let this happen, not to tell him, _this isn't about me,_ but it happens anyway, and the look on Jughead's face says that he'd do anything in that moment for him.

That he'd do anything to make sure Archie never has to think of it again.

It's too late, Archie knows, but the sentiment is appreciated through the sheer insanity of the situation.

It feels like this:

_Sickness and health, both warring over his body and mind, begging him to succumb._

It feels like this:

_Dreams and nightmares, stabbing and healing his mind, his soul, pinpricks of light and darkness in his eyes._

It feels like this:

 _Warmth as wet, cold lips press jarringly to his, not what he expected at all, nothing like anything before, not_ I wanted this, _but not - not-_

Archie doesn't really realise he's crying until he's dropped to his knees in the burning sand, the wind tunnel in his chest choking him, suffocating him in all the things that are racing through his mind at higher and higher speeds and he's holding blindly, tightly to the only thing that can anchor him and that one thing is Jughead's wide, blue eyes.

The wide, blue eyes that he's been gazing into for years, eyes that never should have that kind of hate in them, not even hate for Archie, hate for himself. Eyes full of shock and panic, like he's trying to decide whether he should save him, how he can save him, if it's even possible to save him, wondering if he's maybe too far gone.

If maybe both of them are.

Jughead's looking at him like he's realised what dying may ensue, and everything seems to start back up in him, there in front of Archie, in the sand, face pinked from the sun, holding Archie's face in his hands, telling him everything and nothing.

Looking at him like he's still fighting, but instead of fighting on the side of a war that knows it's going to lose, is fighting to end that side, fighting to ensure their demise.

Jughead looks like Archie maybe brought him back to life.

It's like this:

_Archie kisses him, and it's nothing like the last one._

It's like this:

_They're standing under a sun that has intent to peel their skin from their bones, and there is nothing but them._

It's like this:

_Archie has never been more alive, than standing there, in the desert, with a boy who had run out there to die._

**Fin.**

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, I really hope you liked this! If you did, please feel free to leave a comment and/or a kudos, and track me down on Tumblr.
> 
> Some other notes: go ahead and check out @angeburger and @Lyxxie's other works, as well as the ever-present @oopsiwroteathing, because they're all awesome and deserve your recognition.
> 
> Again, thank you!


End file.
